Some of the missing papers from the consulate are said to list names of Libyans who are working with Americans, putting them potentially at risk from extremist groups....

According to senior diplomatic sources, the US State Department had credible information 48 hours before mobs charged the consulate in Benghazi, and the embassy in Cairo, that American missions may be targeted, but no warnings were given for diplomats to go on high alert and "lockdown"....

I also like his eminence, Future Secretary of State John Kerry, spouting off today. One of the best moves Romney can make is to preannounce some cabinet selections, at the very least John Bolton as SoS.

Well, it's not his fault. He's a great president. Everyone should stop making a big deal out of unimportant events. His staff didn't have time to craft a response directing extra security, the question was unanticipated.

BTW, did Romney step in it or what? What a dufus. Totally not ready for prime time. Not CinC material.

Don't we need a Congressional investigation of how the State Department failed to protect our personnel and facilities against a known risk? How about a joint select committee, equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats? This is too important to allow the Administration to claim that it's a partisan witch hunt, like the Fast and Furious hearings. There must be some serious and honorable Democrats who want to get to the bottom of this.

Obama's (failed) foreign policy. It seems they were going to hit Romney with it. But it hit them first. I hope Romney will educate the masses on what a failure Obama has been -- it is going to be doubly difficult given the cacophony of the fucking media. Do they have any shame?

Isn't it strange that obama can't even feign interest in whats going on an continues to hit fund raisers as if this is a minor hurricaine or inconvenience. He really can't be bothered, can he? It looks like we have obama's Katrina moment. Thankfully it will sink his worthless ass.

Yeah it's something how some of you guys who wouldn't disgrace the litter box with a MSM pub like this are suddenly in for a dollar.

It is always interesting when a biased outlet makes a statement counter to its normal bias.

Similarly, it is interesting when an Obama supporter makes half a dozen posts about an Obama administration debacle and can't come up with anything better than "you guys shouldn't even be talking about this". :)

Isn't it strange that obama can't even feign interest in whats going on an continues to hit fund raisers as if this is a minor hurricaine or inconvenience. He really can't be bothered, can he? It looks like we have obama's Katrina moment. Thankfully it will sink his worthless ass.

That's a bush league thought. Like Obama and all of his advisers and staff have no idea what's going on. They can't appreciate what the rest of the world thinks of them going bowling in the middle of our current crisis.

At least we have you to help us decipher the tea leaves of the White House.

Personally I think the messages Obama is actually sending are not going to be detected by you.

I'm not saying that we shouldn't be outraged by the story itself if this is true, but let's save a little of that outrage for the senior diplomatic sources who thought it would be okay to tell a newspaper reporter what our intel people knew and when they knew it. It's bad enough that we were caught with our pants down, now we have to compound the problem by letting those responsible know that they've been compromised so they can try to tighten up their operation. The leaks need to stop. Somebody at State needs to find their head on a pike.

Similarly, it is interesting when an Obama supporter makes half a dozen posts about an Obama administration debacle and can't come up with anything better than "you guys shouldn't even be talking about this".

"Isn't it strange that obama can't even feign interest in whats going on an continues to hit fund raisers as if this is a minor hurricaine or inconvenience. He really can't be bothered, can he? It looks like we have obama's Katrina moment. Thankfully it will sink his worthless ass."

Who knows. People can be incredibly stubborn.

As for Obama carrying on like this is some minor hurricane that will blow over... it worked for him last time, didn't it? Huge existential crisis and he won by going to fund raisers and acting unruffled while McCain ran back to D.C. and gave the impression of being frantic.

The thing is... for Senators that may have worked. What can one more guy do except make more noise?

Strangely no demands for a press conference by Secretary Clinton and Asst. Secretary of State for diplomatic security Eric Boswell so that they may face the " Do you now regret . . ." line of questioning that is now so popular.

Stunning that these two officials, who presumably have direct responsibility for this mess, have evaded any scrutiny whatsoever.

Isn't it strange that obama can't even feign interest in whats going on an continues to hit fund raisers as if this is a minor hurricaine or inconvenience. He really can't be bothered, can he? It looks like we have obama's Katrina moment. Thankfully it will sink his worthless ass.

That's a bush league thought. Like Obama and all of his advisers and staff have no idea what's going on.

According to all the reports, that's EXACTLY the case. We knew this was coming and did NOTHING.

Would it be too insensitive to laugh at a stupid US diplomat that trusted the state department?

I suppose that I should have watched more Oprahs, but this whole thing comes across as a silly farce. A bunch of muslims, aka superstitious arab idiots, kill a bureaucratic fool and then lewinsky-press chest beating all around and then ohmygawds! until commercial.

What makes you a "partisan hack" is that you are posting here in complete denial of the facts as they are coming out about this event. Obama and his administration royally screwed up here by any measure, not the least of which was Obama's speech in which he declared that justice would be done (he even used his favorite phrase, "make no mistake") and then immediately jetting off for a fundraiser. While a U.S. Ambassador and three other American citizens lay dead, only one of whom was identified at the time. Not good optics, my friend.

Now, even in light of his many failings, you are still going to vote for him. So my question would be, what exactly would he have to do in order for you to not vote for him?

Looks like several people F'd up badly, compromised the mission and likely got themselves killed.

That classified material. Yeah, I know they don't call it that, but a list of locals working covertly for the US has GOT to be classified should never be onside a vault in paper form. Encrypted on a DVD, sure. I suspect we'll not know, but I hope that the local station chief was one of the ones killed, as opposed to some poor smuck. It sounds heartless, but when fecal matter hits the blades, and people die because of mistakes, its better that the guys ho made the mistake pay the price instead of some underling. e.g. The Ambassador, the State Security guy and the CIA Station chief. Saves money on the trial...

PS: yeah, I know it isn't the military, so there would not be a trial for Dereliction of Duty, etc, but you get my feelings on the topic.

“I asked National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor about the findings, and whether there were any instances where the president attended the intelligence meeting that were not on his public schedule. Vietor did not dispute the numbers, but said the fact that the president, during a time of war, does not attend his daily intelligence meeting on a daily basis is ‘not particularly interesting or useful.’ He says that the president read his PDB every day, and he disagreed with the suggestion that there is any difference whatsoever between simply reading the briefing book and having an interactive discussion of its contents with top national security and intelligence officials where the president can probe assumptions and ask questions. ‘I actually don’t agree at all,’ Vietor told me in an e-mail, ‘The president gets the information he needs from the intelligence community each day.’”

(Mark Thiessen, Op-Ed, “Why Is Obama Skipping More Than Half Of His Daily Intelligence Meetings?,” The Washington Post , 9/10/12)

Calm down, wingnuts. It's perfectly clear that President 4-Dimensional Chessmaster had bogus "intel" placed in the Benghazi consulate after he got advance word of the coming attack from his Libyan freedom-fighter buds.

Mom! Obama didn't attend the intelligence briefing again today! Why lord sake, no wonder we have upheavals in libya.

The chief of staff has tried, everybody's tried to tell him, "One of these days Libya's gonna blow up in your face... and you...what were doing, wise guy? Skipping the intelligence briefing and, and smoking!

There was, according to witnesses, little defence put up by the 30 or more local guards meant to protect the staff. Ali Fetori, a 59-year-old accountant who lives near by, said: "The security people just all ran away and the people in charge were the young men with guns and bombs."

Wissam Buhmeid, the commander of the Tripoli government-sanctioned Libya's Shield Brigade, effectively a police force for Benghazi, maintained that it was anger over the Mohamed video which made the guards abandon their post. "There were definitely people from the security forces who let the attack happen because they were themselves offended by the film; they would absolutely put their loyalty to the Prophet over the consulate. The deaths are all nothing compared to insulting the Prophet."

Asking tough questions of the President of the United States (especially in light of current events), holding him accountable for his disengagement on national security issues, as a citizen or a journalist, is exactly like being an obnoxious tattle tale, trying to get the cool kid in trouble over smoking. "Tattling" to American voters.

Now I understand why most of the media acts the way it does. They're cool kids, protecting the cool kid. Of course, now I see the light, thank you. Journalists aren't supposed to be tattle tales, what was I thinking! Why can't we nerdy types be as cool as you Obama supporters, who cover for the cool kid and let him smoke his cigarette (miss his intelligence briefings) in peace.

Now I understand why most of the media acts the way it does. They're cool kids, protecting the cool kid. Of course, now I see the light, thank you. Journalists aren't supposed to be tattle tales, what was I thinking! Why can't we nerdy types be as cool as you Obama supporters, who cover for the cool kid and let him smoke his cigarette (miss his intelligence briefings) in peace.

I don't speak for or to journalists, but you guys could use a little more cool.

Start by waiting to see what's happening before tossing in your (worthless) opinions about what's going on in Libya and Egypt.

Asking tough questions of the President of the United States (especially in light of current events), holding him accountable for his disengagement on national security issues, as a citizen or a journalist, is exactly like being an obnoxious tattle tale, trying to get the cool kid in trouble over smoking. "Tattling" to American voters.

Slightly OT, but it is interesting to note that not only were the Americans put on notice 48 hours before the 9/11/12 attacks, but that Obama, again, missed the PDBs covering such.

Start by waiting to see what's happening before tossing in your (worthless) opinions about what's going on in Libya and Egypt.

"Worthless opinions," nice. Now there's that "good faith" you're demanding of Chip S. So it seems, according to you, that the only people whose opinions have any worth, who can appropriately opine on current events, are members of the Obama administration. Is that right? Everyone else: shut up!

It's not like Obama or Democrats would ever toss in their opinions on something before all the facts come in, events are concluded, all consequences and implications visible. (I don't need to reel off a list here, do I.)

We have to wait for the fully-formed narrative to come in from on high. Then we can opine.

My feeling is that getting a stack of advisories (at one time my job was to take these off a printer and make sure they were decoded properly without actually reading them... it's a trick) that have been sorted through and condensed and pre-gurgitated for you and reading them... is a good thing.

But, my feeling is that you get more information when you get the briefing from the pre-gurgitator. Do it every day? Maybe not. But you can't ask a stack of papers why they chose to include this or that advisory over something else, that you realize you're not seeing. Why *this*? You can't ask a piece of paper that seems routine why it's in your in basket.

Leaving off in-person briefings, as he seems to have done, after there was already some indication that something was going on, does seem as though he thought a pile of papers was equivalent, was the same as listening to a voice and inflections as each item was described. No questions to ask? No, "Where exactly is Benghazi?" I honestly don't expect any president to know where all of our consulates are located or how they're staffed. And someone can try to anticipate questions and add little notes with that information, but it strikes me a just a little bit incurious of him.

He didn't need to see his Afghan theater commander face-to-face for how many months?

Sure, there's more to find out and a whole lot we won't find out about this whole mess, but we do need to somehow evaluate the job he's doing. Not seeing a real need for face-to-face on extremely important issues is something to evaluate.

And who knows, maybe it explains why he thought it was okay to say that Egypt wasn't an ally... maybe he just never *talks* about these subjects with real people often enough to know how to do it.

Apparently, not only did the embassys not get notified, but the President missed all of the relevant briefings - finding it more important to attend fund raisers and campaign events than worry about such trivial matters as any attempts by al Quada and other militant Islamists to make a statement on the 11th anniversary of 9/11. Apparently, the last PDB he attended before the attacks was on 9/5, almost a week before the anniversary and the corresponding attacks. And, he apparently hasn't done much better since then.

This should be embarrassing to the President and all of his supporters, that he is so little interested in national security threats that he would attend less than 40% of his PDBs this year, due to his overriding priority of campaigning for reelection, playing golf, raising money, etc. But, of course, they aren't.

But, with this example at the top, is it any surprise that the warning was not passed to the embassy staffs?

This is probably the best movie I have ever seen. Better than Casablanca and yet are side is not embracing it. This is why we lose elections. You are all wimps. Embrace this movie and be willing to suffer any ramifications that cum our way.

Where is fucking needy in supporting this amazing art, granted it aint fatties protesting in Madison, but still it is incredible art.

Needy needs to get on a plane to Libya or Egypt now and document this shit, afterall he doesn't actually have a real job. And take morbidly obese Palladian with you=the lack of cheesecake and chocolate will prove both interesting and depressing.

Start by waiting to see what's happening before tossing in your (worthless) opinions about what's going on in Libya and Egypt.

We know that American diplomats are dead because they weren't properly protected; and it happened on Obama's watch, as a result of his "kinetic action" (or whatever bulllshit term they used instead of "war"), which was not authorized by Congress. That's enough for me to hold this administration's feet to the fire and demand some answers. They fucking own it.

And I second the person who said why hasn't the media demanded a press conference by Hillary?

BTW, I'm one of those independents you expressed concern over. You needn't worry- I can spin the news for myself.

America's Politico asks, "Why is this not in NYT or WashPost or HuffPost or DailyBeast?...What is going on? I just do not know. Does anyone?"

I'll make a guess. Someone in the diplomatic corps is acquainted what the administration knew, did, and did not do which led to the Libyan murders. This person may be p#ssed at the loss of friends or colleagues and perhaps personally in the same sort of danger that the Libyan team were in. Quite understandably, this person would like security improved. Obviously the administration is clueless, inert, and incapable to get this done, so the whistle blower figures that publicizing the ineptitude might lead to security improvements. This person also knows that telling the story to the NYT, WP, Huffpost, Beast would ensure that some journolist type would rat him or her out to the Obamanoids. Not good for the old career. So, the story goes to a large circulation English paper.

phx said...We know that American diplomats are dead because they weren't properly protected

You don't know that at all, do you, patriot?

Um yeah. We kinda do.The contractor tasked with protecting the ambassador was crawling through bodies looking for a firearm when he was killed. Why didn't he have a loaded firearm of his own? Or did he have one of those stupid beanbag guns like our boarder agents?There are supposed to be armed Marines protecting the ambassador

"Like Obama and all of his advisers and staff have no idea what's going on."

Part of being the leader is to project confidence and command. Skipping your briefing -the day after members of your team are murdered to go campaigning- is not doing that. Obama has made it clear where his priorities lie. And it is not in finding out why his team members and subordinates were murdered.

Expect me to actually be a bit nasty about Obama over this as opposed to polite disagreement I usually have had.

If the report is true that the State Department was warned 48 hours in advance of the attacks on our embassies and did nothing, then those who were derelict in their duty should be punished severely, as far up the chain of command as that dereliction goes.

And you'd better believe that if this was a Republican president, the media would be in full Watergate lather by now. Too bad that all their talk of "journalistic ethics" is, indeed, just talk.

Unless we assume unarmed men in a locked room is adequate security at a location that was known to be a target, had been attacked with explosives earlier this year and where there was known terrorist activities -- and all of this, by the by, is stuff we knew BEFORE we heard about the possible 48-hour warning -- then, yes. They were inadequately protected by any measure reasonable people would have used to protect their subordinates.

I guess the idea of ordering Marines to defend people isn't something that was mentioned in the Cliff Notes version of the briefings Obama picks up and may or may not read.

Apparently, by the way, the administration insists there's no evidence the attacks were premeditated. You know, the ones that managed to get, what was it? Mortar fire? located on target. Just a spontaneous bunch of mortar experts with aiming skills happened to provide cover for another spontaneous bunch of armed men to breach the compound.

Hillary Clinton didn't know what her husband was doing for years on end. When he was caught red-handed with Monica, she claimed it was a right-wing conspiracy.

What's the possibility that she has any clue of what's going on now? For those who consider her to be the smartest woman on earth, she seems like nothing more than a dumb fuck. A lot of that going around lately.

When a businessman reads a report and attends a meeting on that report he asks questions. This appears different from what was in the report last month, or thses numbers seem aggressive or why would this lead to that. As much as anything the questioning of the report's author makes it clear that it is taken seriously and that bullshit or fudged numbers will not suffice.

It is for this reason that briefings are important. And it is for this reason that our president's high opinion of himself is dangerous.

Skipping your briefing -the day after members of your team are murdered to go campaigning- is not doing that. Obama has made it clear where his priorities lie. And it is not in finding out why his team members and subordinates were murdered.

Or maybe he's just making clear which "team members" are more important to him right now.

Among his remarks in Vegas (after referring to the "tough day we had today"):

“And obviously [our] hearts are broken for the families but I wanted to encourage those folks at the State Dept. that they were making a difference,” Obama told volunteer leaders in Las Vegas, according to the pool report. “The sacrifices that our troops and our diplomats make are obviously very different from the challenges that we face here domestically but like them, you guys are Americans who sense that we can do better than we’re doing….I’m just really proud of you.”

Without knowing anything more than the fact that there is a dead ambassador and three staff at a US embassy in an unstable country, it would be dangerously foolish to act as if there were nothing that could have been done to prevent these deaths. We haven't had a dead ambassador since 1979.

It seems reasonable to ask, what did this admin. not do that the other admins. did, to keep ambassadors safe in times of turmoil over the past 30+ years? I would bet money that all ambassadors, their staff and their families would like the answer to that.